Ed, a 29-year-old technology consultant from Chicago, IL, had left The Bachelorette prior to the season's fifth Rose Ceremony after receiving a phone call in which his boss had allegedly told him he would be fired if he didn't leave the show and return to work.

"I had a conference call with my boss this morning and he's giving me a lot of pressure about being here," Ed told Jillian before he decided to leave the show. "He's like 'What are you doing?'"

"Things are starting to snowball and things are kind of starting to fall apart and my boss basically laid it out and said 'Well either you're going to be here working or you're going to be unemployed and you can go and find love,'" Ed explained in an interview afterwards.

"He had just gotten this job. He wanted to keep it. I guess maybe he didn't expect to go as far [on the show] as he did," Judith Elliott told the Chicago Sun-Times after Ed's departure was shown during ABC's broadcast of The Bachelorette's fifth fifth-season episode last month.

"I realized that I made a huge mistake, I got home and I could not stop thinking about you," Ed told Jillian when he returned and attempted to convince her to give him a second chance. "I felt like I need to re-prioritize what I'm doing and I think I need to be here with you. I want another shot."

After thinking it over, Jillian decided to allow Ed to return -- which eventually led to the season's final Rose Ceremony in which she selected him over Kiptyn Locke, a 31-year-old business developer from Encinitas, CA.

Despite their rocky start, the couple's relationship has continued to grow since the finale was filmed two months ago, according to Ed's father.

"They had so much chemistry from the beginning," Edward Swiderski Jr. told the Monroe News. "She's an exceptionally fine girl and they are incredibly in love."

(Photo credit ABC)

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